


Road Trip

by sansybones, withtheworms



Series: Rehab Cabin DLC [5]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Post-Pacifist Ending, everyone's having a great time, rehab cabin DLC, skelebros, this will be fun this will be fine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-15
Updated: 2016-08-15
Packaged: 2018-08-09 00:18:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7779259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sansybones/pseuds/sansybones, https://archiveofourown.org/users/withtheworms/pseuds/withtheworms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Rehab Cabin DLC fic by @withtheworms</p><p>Set post-Pacifist ending, with monsters now living among humans on the surface.   For a certain skeleton, things above-ground have reached a breaking point, and the decision has been made to move Sans out of harm’s way and relocate him to a cabin far, far outside the city. </p><p>(Temporarily, of course.  This is absolutely temporary.)</p><p>(…. Right?)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Road Trip

**Author's Note:**

> Part of the Rehab Cabin DLC fic/au/extended headcanon by myself and SansyBones. In a nutshell: Resets messed Sans up beyond repair and he has no concept of chronological time. Things get bad before they get better, but nothing's ever really "okay." It's sad! Anyway, there's (lots) more here: http://rehabcabin.tumblr.com/

The drive to the cabin had been…

Not bad, actually.  Not bad at all.

Papyrus had expected some sort of struggle or resistance in the eleventh hour, a digging-in of heels or a blatant refusal, maybe some sort of disappearing act, but Sans had been… pleasant.  Excited, even.  

The car had been packed mostly by Papyrus, Sans having already demonstrated his complete inability to organize things, though at some point Undyne had arrived without any formal invitation and begun to help, followed by Alphys and Toriel and (strangely, Papyrus thought in retrospect) Doggo. (No Frisk, though.  It made Papyrus a little sad, but since the incident at the ice cream parlour No Humans Around Sans was the rule.)  By the time the skeleton brothers had been ready to start driving a decent-sized group had amassed, hanging out on the front steps of their now empty house and milling about on the lawn.  

Papyrus hadn’t planned it to go this way.  He’d wanted to slip away quietly, without any fanfare– for Sans’ sake, as well as for his own.  Something had begun to weigh heavier and heavier in his chest the more monsters had arrived, and when the small group had turned their collective attention on him, and Toriel, with a soft, sad smile, speaking on behalf of them all, had said: “good luck” he’d felt his resolve to go weaken.  

It had only been Sans’ eagerness to get moving, barely acknowledging the collective goodbye as he jumped into the car, reaching across to the driver’s side to honk the horn and calling for Papyrus to hustle, that had prevented Papyrus from changing his mind.  Sans rarely got motivated for anything, but he was excited about this, and whatever prickling of tears Papyrus had felt edging his eye sockets faded as he climbed into the driver’s seat.

“Well, it’s time for us to be skele _gone_ ,” Sans had said, leaning his head out the open passenger-side window, earning a mix of groans and forced laughter from the assembled monsters. “But hey, I can see from the tears in your eyes that we’re really going to be _mist_.”

“Just go, already,” Burgerpants had said, heckling from the sidelines and receiving a sharp elbow in the ribs for it. (Burgerpants had been another arrival that had surprised Papyrus.   _Even Burgerpants_ , he’d thought.  It was oddly humbling to find out how many among the community cared, and how much the skeletons clearly meant to them.)

Toriel had stepped forward, the look in her eyes uncertain despite all her previous insistence that this was the right thing to do.  She’d leaned forward and kissed Sans once on the bridge of bone between his eyes, which had made him blush and duck his head, mumbling something Papyrus hadn’t heard as she’d spoken to them both.

“Drive safe.  Let us know when you’ve arrived and are settled in.”

“We won’t have internet for a week, at least.  I’m not sure about phone reception but… we’ll figure something out.” When he put it like that it had felt like a death sentence, and Papyrus found himself tightening his grip on the steering wheel, dredging up all of his resolve to turn the key in the ignition and back out of the driveway.  He’d wished Mettaton had been there, but leaving was better this way.  Neither of the skeletons needed the additional reminders of who else they were leaving behind.  Not for the first time, Papyrus was relieved nobody had bothered (or perhaps had intentionally forgotten) to tell Grillby.  Even imagining the scene that might have unfolded had the bartender shown up made his non-existent stomach twist.

“Alright.  Goodbye, then.”

The words had felt so settled and final coming from him, but Toriel had simply smiled.

“Not goodbye for long, though.  We’ll see you both soon.”

They’d started driving, and it had taken all of Papyrus’ will power not to look in the rearview mirror and watch all that he was leaving shrink behind him.

It wasn’t a time to grieve, though.  It was exciting.  It was a new adventure.  It was good for Sans.  

It was the right thing to do.  

To his credit, Sans’ personality shift had been obvious almost the moment Papyrus’ foot had touched the gas, and it had only become more pronounced as they passed out of the city limits and forged deeper off the beaten path.  It was like something lifted off his shoulders and began to pull him out of himself.  The forced-casual facade and brittle-around-the-edges smile remained, but there was something beneath them- a certain tone to his voice- that Papyrus longed to believe felt more natural and less compressed by stress.  By the time they’d pulled up to the cabin (after hours of driving, one missed off-ramp, a gas-station miscommunication Papyrus was _sure_ they’d laugh about eventually, and navigating the long, rutted dirt driveway that wound lazily up to their new home) he’d been practically buzzing (as much as Sans could buzz, anyway).

“Is that it? Paps, check it out!” The car hadn’t come to a full stop before Sans opened the door and sprang out, moving quickly across the driveway, cupping his hands around his eye sockets to peer into the darkened windows of the cabin as he waited impatiently for Papyrus to complete his post-drive check and finally put the car in park.

“The key should be under the doormat-”

“Got it!” Sans hadn’t waited for Papyrus to finish, rooting out the key and holding the screen door open with his foot as he turned the lock.  The door swung inward and he’d disappeared inside before Papyrus had cleared the steps leading up to the front porch.

Looking back on it now it had been… strange.  A complete role reversal, as Papyrus stood in the doorway with his arms loosely crossed and Sans moved eagerly around the interior of the cabin; opening cupboards, checking closets, getting halfway up the stairs before something caught his attention and he came back down.  

“This place is _great_ , Paps! Look- it’s all set up for us!”

The cabin _was_ set up for them.  A combination of it having come already furnished by the previous owner, and a solid week of effort on behalf of Toriel, Alphys, and Frisk, who had cleaned it top to bottom in preparation for their arrival.  It had been their “going away” present for Papyrus, and a “come back soon” gift for Sans.

Papyrus considered how he’d have to thank them properly the next time they were in the city, and the thought hung in his head as he caught himself already wondering when that next time would be.  Luckily, his calculating was cut short, having to step aside as Sans edged him out of the way, heading back towards the car.

“Come on, let’s get everything unloaded and start unpacking!”

It wasn’t like Sans to take initiative, and Papyrus was half way to asking what this doppelganger had done with his brother before he decided the best (and perhaps only) course of action was to let Sans’ enthusiasm run its course.  This was what they were here for.  This was how they were going to help him get better.

It took far too many trips; shuttling bags and cardboard boxes out of the trunk of the car and from inside the tiny trailer they’d hauled with them from the city, and piling it all in a large mound on the open floor of the living room.  By the end they were both tired, hot, and achy, sitting side by side on the front steps of the cabin as the late afternoon sun cut long shadows across the front yard.  

“Is that Mount Ebott?”

The question came out suddenly and hung between them, and Papyrus shifted uneasily, finding himself avoiding wanting to look at Sans.

“Yes…” he said at length, wishing he could lie, but knowing it would do more harm than good in the long run. “That’s it.”

“Huh.” Sans studied the mountain silently for a moment. “You can see it pretty clear from here, eh?”

Papyrus braced for it, readying himself for the calm to shatter; the pleasantness and the jokes and the easy attitude that had returned between them replaced by that brittle, untethered anxiousness that had taken such tight hold of his brother.

“Is that bad?…” he ventured at last, when it became clear Sans wasn’t planning on following up his statement with anything more.

Sans tilted his head, rubbing the side of his jaw as he considered Papyrus’ question.  Then he grinned– genuinely, with nothing forced in the lift at the corners of his smile.

“Nah.  It’s nice to see it again, y’know? I didn’t get such a good look at it, last time.”

They settled into silence again, broken several minutes later by Sans, his voice somewhat more subdued.

“It’s a little weird, actually.  Everything else- the entire Underground… I knew every inch of it.  There was nothing- no unfamiliarities, y’know? I had it all down like the back of my hand.”

He held up his hand to Papyrus to illustrate his point, and Papyrus noticed immediately the almost imperceptible shake that was there, the small bones quivering just slightly.

“But I only ever saw it from the outside once.”

He laughed– a weak, dry chuckle.

“I could tell you how many trees are on the road in to Snowdin, how many shingles are on the roof at Grillby’s, every title of every book in the library, but I don’t know the colour of our new house, or the address, or... or how long we've lived there.  I don’t know where Alphys and Undyne live, I don't know if they're married or... I haven’t paid _any_ attention to Tori and what she’s doing… I can’t remember.  It was all moving so fast, y’know?”

It was the first time he’d heard Sans speak candidly about any of this, and Papyrus found himself at a loss for words.  With nothing to say he extended a hand, laying it gently on his brother’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry, Paps…” Sans said at last, his gaze fixed on a place somewhere around where his feet perched on the bottom step. “I fucked this up. Everybody worked so hard, and we all waited for so long.  It was supposed to be a nice, happy ending, but I made it difficult for everybody.  I hurt and upset... all of you.”

“Not on purpose,” Papyrus said quickly, his voice gentle and understanding. “You weren’t doing it on purpose.”

“It should have been easy but it wasn’t.  I couldn’t… I didn’t know how to make it work.” Sans forced a laugh, though it stuttered in his chest, and he raised a hand to rub the heel of his palm against his eye, which was suddenly stinging with tears. “I dunno.  I’m really fucked up, Paps.  No one else found it as hard as I did.” He paused, his gaze shifting to the outline of Mount Ebott. “And now we’re _here_ …”

“I’m here because I want to be,” Papyrus said, putting that anxiety out quickly. “And you’re here because you _need_ to be.  We’re going to have a nice summer, and we’re going to work on this, and get you settled, and it’s going to be great.”

He wasn’t sure which of them needed convincing more, but eventually Sans nodded, drawing in a deep, steadying breath as his hands gripped his knees.

“Maybe we should start unpacking what we brought in…” he said at last, though his previous enthusiasm for the activity was noticeably absent.

“How about we decide which of us gets which room?” Papyrus suggested instead, picking up on his lack of motivation.

“Heh, I thought maybe I’d take ‘em both and make you sleep in the bathtub.”

“Nyeh, in your dreams.” Papyrus nudged him gently, and Sans managed a small laugh, hesitating when Papyrus stood up and offered him a hand before eventually taking it, allowing his brother to help him to his feet.

“Right then,” he grinned, winking his left eye as he took a deep breath. “Bedrooms, eh? Okay then: last one upstairs is a Temmie Flake.”

Despite his threat, Sans moved inside with no particular haste, though to his credit Papyrus didn’t try to race him.  Instead he paused in the door way, looking again at the hunched shape of the mountain in the distance.  

 _This was going to be fine,_ he assured himself, trying not to notice how quiet it was, or think about how alone they were out here. _This was what Sans needed.  This was going to be good– for both of them._

_This wasn’t a death sentence, it was healthy._

_This wasn’t going to be forever._


End file.
